A rebellious and generally anti-Administration Congress has succeeded in pruning, slashing and in some cases eliminating foreign aid grants ranging from fertilizers to military hardware to several countries in the past three weeks.
The action by members in both the Senate and House came after their anger was aroused by the disclosure that the CIA had played a nefarious role in helping to topple the Chilean government of President Salvador Allende Gossens in Sept. 1973. Some of this anger turned to fury with disclosures that Turkey’s invasion of Cyprus last July was made possible with arms purchased under U.S. military aid.
Despite warnings from President Ford and Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger that foreign aid slashes would undermine America’s foreign relations, and especially endanger U.S. efforts to help work out a settlement between Turkey and Cyprus, many Congressmen from both major parties wielded their legislative grappling hooks to mutilate foreign aid credits and grants to Turkey. Chile and South Vietnam.
ALL FOREIGN AID AT STAKE
The Congressional objections to U.S. aid particularly to Turkey. has forced Kissinger to cancel his plans to visit Ankara in the first stage of an attempt to mediate the Turkish-Cypriote dispute. It also has drawn fire from Ford who threatened to veto pending legislation cutting off U.S. military aid to Turkey, If he does so. it could escalate a foreign policy fight that could tie up the entire foreign aid program.
The defiant Congressmen have contended, until now, that the cuts are aimed at those nations which have violated the civil rights of their own citizens and those countries which have used military hardware purchased with U.S. foreign aid credits and grants against neighboring states In the case of Turkey, some Congressmen have rejected warnings from the White House and other Congressmen that cutting aid would force Turkey to turn to the Arab states and give the Soviet Union a chance to fill the breach.
ELEMENTS OF CONCERN
But the chopping spree is beginning to concern many supporters of Israel. Their concern is focused on a number of elements. Just how far will this spree go? Can the Congressional -Administration conflict bottle up all foreign aid programs for an indefinite time, thereby holding back additional aid to Israel while the Soviet Union continues to arm Syria? Can the arguments raised by some Congressmen against giving aid to those countries who violate the territorial integrity of their neighbors be applied against Israel in its defensive actions against terrorist strongholds in Lebanon? Can the anti-Israel Congressional bloc muster sufficient support to turn the tide against Israel?
Supporters of Israel also point to several developments on the domestic and international fronts that give cause of concern and which, they say, bear careful consideration.
WHITTLING AWAY OF FOREIGN AID
On Sept. 24. Defense Secretary James Schlesinger chastised Congress for reducing the Administration – requested $1.4 billion to South Vietnam to $700 million for the current fiscal year although, he noted. Congress had approved $2.2 billion for Israel after the Yom Kippur War. Schlesinger made it clear that he did not begrudge Israel this aid but noted that cutting aid to South Vietnam placed a strain on the Administration’s credit and resolve.
On Sept. 30. the Senate rejected legislation in the form of an amendment to the foreign aid bill that would have cut off aid to oil-producing nations that refused to cooperate in lowering oil prices. This action followed a sharp debate on the amendment offered by Frank Church (D.Idaho). Senate Democratic Leader Mike Mansfield (D. Mont.) and Hubert Humphrey (D.Minn.) warned that the amendment would accelerate economic war with the Arab states. The contention of some other Senators, including J. William Fulbright (D. Ark.) and James Abourezk (D.S.D.). was that the best way to lower oil prices was to exert more pressure on Israel to withdraw from occupied Arab territories.
On Oct. 3. the Senate-House Conference Committee rejected, through Administration maneuvering, an additional $300 million in grant aid to Israel. The Committee did, however, approve legislation that extends funds for Israel at the current rate of $50 million in economic aid and $300 million in military sales. The additional grant proposal of $200 million in economic aid and $100 million in military aid was offered by Sen. Water Mondale (D.Minn.) as an amendment to the resolution continuing the 1973-74 program that would give Israel Senate-backed funding.
Administration lobbyists under instructions from Ford and Kissinger were reported to have told key Conference Committee members that additional funds for Israel without the same treatment for Egypt and Syria would hamper Kissinger’s efforts to make progress in negotiations during his current Mideast Trip.
In addition, on Oct. 3, the Defense Department confirmed a report by the U.S. National Security Council that an arms balance exists between Israel and her Arab neighbors, Egypt and Syria. Pentagon sources noted that the balance in the U.S. view was Israel’s capability in relation to those two countries but not also in relation to Jordan and Iraq which participated with Egypt and Syria in the war against Israel last Oct. Moreover, it was reliably reported that Ford is to decide whether a military balance exists and to what extent Israel should be supplied with arms.
LOGIC OF OBJECTIVE, DEVELOPMENTS
Despite assurances from White House and Capitol Hill sources that neither the Administration nor Congress is in an anti-Israel mood, one knowledgeable observer said: “The logic of objective developments in this country and abroad may push Congress and the Administration, despite its best intentions, to whittle down additional aid to Israel, How long can Congress cut aid to other countries, for whatever reasons, and blithely continue aid to Israel?”
How long, he continued, will it be before European countries, gripped in the crunch of continuing oil price hikes and the consequent disasters to their economies, begin to pressure the U.S. to ease off on its aid to Israel as the price for bailing the Western world’s economies out of the inflationary spiral and production cutbacks due in part to the high oil prices?
Unquestionably, the high oil prices and threats of renewed embargoes by the Arab oil-producing states and the Organization of Petroleum Export- ing Countries which include 13 Arab countries is vital factor in the consideration of some sections of Congress and will, in all likelihood, condition further responses to additional aid to Israel.
OIL CRUNCH AS ECONOMIC FACT
The oil crunch is no longer a problem of propaganda as such by the Arabs and their allies It is an established economic fact. It is, as former Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban said, repeatedly, a design by the former colonized nations to colonize their former colonizers. The oil squeeze has been linked in Arab propaganda to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Some Congressmen have accepted this as valid. The fact is, however, that this squeeze would have occurred even without the conflict and even if there was no Israel, The unconscionable price hikes are basically due to economic greed by the oil producing nations and oil cartels.
In fact, Valentin Hernandez, Venezuela’s Minister of Mines, said last week after the Venezuelan government announced that the U.S. and other foreign oil companies operating in the country would be subject to a substantial tax increase in the last quarter of this year, that this is in line with recent decisions of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) of which Venezuela was a founder. The reason for the hike, he noted. is to cut down “excess profits” that the oil companies made in the first nine months.
But the oil crunch is also a political and economic weapon used especially by the Arab oil-producing states against what they term American imperialism, and to prove that warnings by the U.S. on oil prices will not be accepted with equanimity, It is also a weapon which the Arabs hope they can use to bludgeon the U.S. into forcing Israel against the wall. Venezuela, one of the founders of OPEC, has not resorted to linking high oil prices to the Mideast conflict.
THEORY AND PRACTICE DO NOT COINCIDE
The U.S. also insists that it does not link the Arab-Israeli conflict to the Arab oil squeeze. Kissinger has time and again stated that the Arab-Israeli talks and the oil crisis are to be kept separate. To shore up this view the State Department originally said that Kissinger’s current Mideast trip would include only Egypt, Jordan. Syria and Israel.
However, on the eve of his departure, the Secretary announced that he would also visit oil-rich Saudi Arabia and Morocco and Algeria. The last two countries have extensive gas and oil resources. Kissinger’s trip to these countries and Saudi Arabia indicate, to some observer, that the U.S. Administration may be able in theory to separate negotiations for a Mideast settlement from the oil crisis, but it is not possible to separate them in practice.
In addition to these pressures and considerations, Congress also has other considerations, especially prior to the Nov. 5 elections, such as rampant inflation, a bleak industrial outlook, and mounting unemployment. There is a growing mood in Congress and in the labor movement that more attention must be paid to domestic needs than to foreign ones, if only in order to avert civil unrest.
These domestic and international developments are placing the U.S. in an untenable position of frustration in dealing with the demands of wage earners at home, the needs of its European and Arab market partners abroad, and settling the Mideast conflict. The U.S. is walking a veritable tightrope trying to accommodate itself to these diverse elements.
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